Unlocking the mysteries of the Red Planet: Curiosity rover conducted a second drilling Martian Rock

U.S. rover Curiosity executed a second drill in a Martian rock, which will yield a sample to be analyzed later by instruments on board the NASA sent robot on Mars in /25/6/2013, the U.S. space agency announced.
 
Curiosity made ​​on May 19th, a hole diameter of 1.6 inches and a depth of 6.6 inches in a rock called "Cumberland" with a drill before the end of its robotic arm, Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced (JPL), NASA affiliate on its website.

Material from inside the rock will be transferred to the component laboratory instruments inside the robot, in the coming days.

Curiosity collected on February 20, the first sample inside a Martian sedimentary rocks, considered a first successful planetary outside Earth.

Based on the analysis of that sample, NASA concluded that Mars had an environment in its past existence of microorganisms, including quantities of water with an acidity level was not too high.

Roca called "Cumberland" like the first rock drilling Curiosity in February and was named "John Klein" in memory of a former NASA specialist.

New rock is at a distance of 2.75 meters from "John Klein", said engineers at JPL who piloted Curiosity mission.

Curiosity, a one ton vehicle with six wheels, which cost $ 2.5 billion, the hardest and most sophisticated robot ever sent to Mars came down in the Martian equatorial Gale Crater on August 6, 2012, for a mission at least two years. The main objective of the mission is to determine whether the red planet allowed her past existence of microbial life.

Since his arrival on Mars, Curiosity has traveled a distance of 700 meters per Martian soil.

American Rover will soon turn to the foot of Mount Sharp, a massive 5,500 meters high is located in the center of Gale Crater, located eight kilometers from where the robot is at the moment.

Since Curiosity is running at a speed of no more than 0.15 km / hour, the robot will take several months to reach its final destination.

Foot of Mount Sharp, consisting of different sedimentary layers, the signs of exposure in the past, the action of liquid water.